Night weaning 5 month old

My DD (dear daughter) is 5 months old and I’d like to wean her night feedings down to 1. I think she’s ready and I definitely am. Here’s some info regarding our situation.

She is sleep trained. She has 3-4 naps each day depending on the length of her naps. She usually goes down for bed between 6:30-7:30 and typically she wakes up 2 times to feed during the night; usually at the 5 hour mark (sometimes earlier) and again after 3-4 hours. Every so often she will wake up to feed three times but not often. She is EBF (extended breastfeeding, exclusively breastfeeding) but I do give her about 2 ounces of fruit or veggie purée each day. The longest stretch she has ever slept has been 7 hours and this has not been recently.

I’m not really sure where to begin. I’m not looking to drop the feeds completely but it would be so nice to drop to 1 ( I actually enjoy our night feed- just don’t want so as many lol). I prefer not to do a straight CIO (cry it out) method if possible but I know there may be some crying involved. Thanks in advance!

She’s been in her own room in her crib since she was 2 months. We use wake times around 2/2.25 hours but she doesn’t always last that long so I’ll put her down earlier sometimes. Bed time routine is get jammies on, feed, then take her upstairs to her room, close her shutters, turn on her white noise machine then sing her 1 lullaby- and she’s in bed wide awake. She is usually asleep within 5 minutes.

She’s been in her own room in her crib since she was 2 months. We use wake ...

Last edited
08/26/2018

She’s been in her own room in her crib since she was 2 months. We use wake times around 2/2.25 hours but she doesn’t always last that long so I’ll put her down earlier sometimes. Bed time routine is get jammies on, feed, then take her upstairs to her room, close her shutters, turn on her white noise machine then sing her 1 lullaby- and she’s in bed wide awake. She is usually asleep within 5 minutes.

I would enforce the 2-2.25 wake times and do 3 naps only. Never 4. Then bedtime 2 hours after the third nap. And I would not feed before 2am. If she wakes before that, the fastest way to deal with it is to give her 10 minutes. If she’s still crying hard and continuously that entire time, then do a check to rule out any issues. You can do more checks but honestly those are more for you than for her. She’ll likely cry much, much less if you only do 1 check and CIO (cry it out) from there.

I would enforce the 2-2.25 wake times and do 3 naps only. Never 4. Then bedti...

Posted
08/26/2018

I would enforce the 2-2.25 wake times and do 3 naps only. Never 4. Then bedtime 2 hours after the third nap. And I would not feed before 2am. If she wakes before that, the fastest way to deal with it is to give her 10 minutes. If she’s still crying hard and continuously that entire time, then do a check to rule out any issues. You can do more checks but honestly those are more for you than for her. She’ll likely cry much, much less if you only do 1 check and CIO from there.

Also, I don’t always rush in when she wakes up; I usually give her a few minutes to see if she’ll go back to sleep. Sometimes she does, other times her cry will turn into her hunger cry and that’s when I go in to feed her. When I do feed her she is hungry and she takes a full feed-it’s not like she’s comfort nursing. So I don’t even know if dropping 1 feed is possible for her?

I would enforce the 2-2.25 wake times and do 3 naps only. Never 4. Then bedti...

Posted
08/26/2018

I would enforce the 2-2.25 wake times and do 3 naps only. Never 4. Then bedtime 2 hours after the third nap. And I would not feed before 2am. If she wakes before that, the fastest way to deal with it is to give her 10 minutes. If she’s still crying hard and continuously that entire time, then do a check to rule out any issues. You can do more checks but honestly those are more for you than for her. She’ll likely cry much, much less if you only do 1 check and CIO from there.

Stupid question I know- but will she be okay going until 2 am? I don’t want her to be hungry. Yes checks during CIO (cry it out) just pissed her off. So I would basically treat it as if I’m ST?

Stupid question I know- but will she be okay going until 2 am? I don’t want...

Posted
08/26/2018

Stupid question I know- but will she be okay going until 2 am? I don’t want her to be hungry. Yes checks during CIO just pissed her off. So I would basically treat it as if I’m ST?

She’ll be hungry because she’s used to snacking before 2am. But being hungry and needing to eat are not the same thing. It’s age appropriate for her to move those calories to the daytime, which she’ll do within a day or two.

My LO (little one) is almost 6 months. We went down to 1 feed from 2 when I realized she was just snacking and neither feed was a full one. Now I feed at 2am at the earliest. For wakings before 2am DH (dear husband) was doing the checks during the transition to say goodnight so LO (little one) couldn’t smell my milk. She got the new normal within a couple nights and now does one good night feed. Good luck!

She’ll be hungry because she’s used to snacking before 2am. But being hun...

Posted
08/26/2018

She’ll be hungry because she’s used to snacking before 2am. But being hungry and needing to eat are not the same thing. It’s age appropriate for her to move those calories to the daytime, which she’ll do within a day or two.

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